In the course of our lives

we will face many challenges that must be overcome. We must decide what that challenge is, and make a decision as to how to overcome said challenge. Often how you overcome the challenge is as important as the act of overcoming it. For the most part these challenges are rather simple, such as getting across a street. A small neighborhood street would have fewer obstacles, cars, while major streets, with multiple lane, will have more obstacles. The basic idea is the same: get from one side to the other. It is the complexities that change. The multi-lane road, with medium, often breaks down into two parts with the first objective being the medium, and the last objective being the other side.

Do you just cross the road, like the chicken, or do you go down to the light? Each time you cross one of these road you make a decision. Go, or not go. Go to the light, or cross here? These are not choices that we really spend much time thinking about, as we do them so often that they are routine. There is a book about Law Enforcement called, “Deadly Routine”, in it the author explains that if we do something, in this case it was traffic stops, we often get to the point that we do not pay them as much attention as we should. We forget that the person in that car can kill us. When I was a cop, security, in the Air Force at one base we would watch some of the Law Enforcement Specialist get out of their patrol vehicle, after stopping a car, and made the initial approach with their pen in one hand and ticket book in the other. That was never a problem, while I was there, but all it would take would be one driver, or passenger, to pull out a weapon and the officer, both hands full of now useless crap, could be dead in seconds.

What does that have to do with the guy crossing the street? Everything. Think of the times you have read of a pedestrian who just wandered into the path of a vehicle and got flattened. For him crossing the road was the “Deadly Routine”. We must remember that every time we do something like this was must approach it as if it is the deadly event that it is. The cop who makes a mistake can get himself, or others, killed, and so he must always be alert to what is going on around him.

Lets consider that cop for a few seconds. His challenge is to get from wherever he is to the location of his call. Lets say this challenge is getting to an “alarm activation”. This means that there may, or may not, be an intruder. Most cop shows, on TV or Movies, will show the cop going up the driveway with the lights and sirens active. It does not show him getting there, or the many close calls he might have had due to drivers who seem to think “he can go around me”. In my Security Police Tech school we were told that our use of the emergency lights was a “request of right of way” not a “demand of right of way”.. We were told that “while how quickly you get to an incident is important, it is NOT important how fast you “didn’t get there“. Now lets look at the emergency equipment. I am sure, if only from watching them on the screen, and hopefully not your rear view mirror, that you are familiar with the lights and sirens. When do you use them? Most department will dispatch the patrol with a code 1,2, or 3, that tells him if the what level the urgency is. Then, once he gets nearby when does he turn off the emergency equipment? Cops show will often have them drive up on the scene with lights and sirens going full blast. If you don’t care if the suspect know you are there this is fine but, if you don’t want them to escape, or take hostages, then you might consider turning off the siren before you get within hearing distance, and the lights, both the visibars and headlights, when you get within sight of the destination. Most time the officer will complete the approach without any lights and park a little ways down from where he is going. This give him a better chance of get close up without being seen.

Besides the criminal neighbors often stroll out to watch the pretty lights, and it is better to have fewer people out if there are in fact shots fired.

So, where am I going with this?

As I have said life is full of challenges and obstacles, and often it is how you overcome these obstacles that is important. Which decisions you make can affect the rest of your life.

Some of these challenges have to do with right and wrong.

Some will use the teaching of their faith to help guide them to the right decision, others will just jump in and hope for the best, while others will just forge ahead and have no idea where they are going.

For the main part I just want you to think about the decision that you make during the day, and to consider them each time like it is the first time you have ever made that choice. I want you to be able to read my stuff, even if you don’t agree. I would like to think I got someone to avoid the “Deadly Routine”.